Near
Field Communications hold a lot of promise for smartphone users as it allows
them to pay for goods and services without having to dig out a credit card or
cash. There are already a number of mobile payment options in use around the world
and more are in the works; the question that remains is if consumers will use
the services.

Visa is testing a NFC payment system in Europe with the iPhone. The system uses
an attachment that plugs into the phone’s dock connector.

Before embarking on the NFC payment trials in Europe, ComputerWorld reports
that Visa conducted a survey to see how much
interest there was for such a system. The survey was conducted in Poland,
Italy, Turkey, and the UK and found that 87% of iPhone users would be willing
to attach an add-on to their smartphone to make mobile payments.

The survey reportedly covered 4,100 people in the four countries. Apple is also
working on ways to bring NFC payments to the iPhone with a system that would
use iTunes as the payment backend. Purchases would be charged to the credit
card that the user has on file. Such as system would work well since iTunes is
already used for purchases small and large. IPhone users are also very used to
paying for things with iTunes.

Apple would presumably get a portion of the purchase price for hosting the
transaction. If the fees for the NFC payment systems are cheaper than those
charged by credit card companies, it might see quick adoption in retail
outlets.

Apple
isn’t alone in looking for a way to grab a piece of the $6.2 trillion yearly
that consumers spend on goods and services. Google is also looking at NFC payments for Android.

“We do believe we have a moral responsibility to keep porn off the iPhone.” -- Steve Jobs